Reign of the Marionettes
This historically charged novel takes place during the late 17thcentury counter-reformation under Charles II. The Duke of York, his heir, has converted to Catholicism, and there is a move to reorganize the monarchy under papal control. The Duke has two daughters, Mary and Anne, but lacks a male heir. He marries a second time to Mary Beatrice, a Catholic.
The story shifts between three perspectives. Elizabeth, wife of the Earl of Powis, is a crypto-Papist, who together with her husband practices Catholicism in private for fear of political enemies. The Protestant story is primarily told by the Earl of Shaftesbury, a Parliamentarian and Anglican, excluded by the King from the circle of nobles who are party to a secret treaty with France and is out to avenge his perceived betrayal. Shaftesbury conspires with the Duke of Buckingham to supplant the secretly Duke of York as heir to the throne. The plot is soon expanded by Titus Oates, an Anglican priest with few morals and a need for power.
The story is robust, complex, and rich in character color. Its style is perhaps necessarily a bit explanatory at times, but compensates with a superb ear for dialogue and an emotional plotline. Sheena MacLeod recognizes in her notes that the period was a time full of unprecedented political and religious unrest. Allegiances changed, constantly fueled more by greed and power than by religious piety. The novel captures all these elements perfectly, and cries out for a stage or screen adaptation. Enthusiastically recommended.
